Plumbing · UK and US · sourced figures
The published figures
| Country and year | Measure | Share of sales |
|---|---|---|
| US, 2022 | Receipts less cost of goods sold | 33.9% |
| US, 2022 | Net income before officers' pay | 8.1% |
| US, 2022 | Net income after officers' pay | 4.8% |
| UK, 2022 | Turnover less purchases and employment costs | 21.3% |
| UK, 2023 | Turnover less purchases and employment costs | 21.7% |
| UK, 2024 | Turnover less purchases and employment costs | 23.2% |
Why the numbers differ
The US figure comes from corporate tax returns, where the owners are usually officers on the payroll. Their pay is a cost, so it is taken off before net income. Add it back and the US figure moves from 4.8% to 8.1%.
The UK figure counts employment costs for employees only. A sole trader or partner takes drawings, which are not employment costs, so their living comes out of the 21.3% to 23.2%. So do depreciation on vans and tools, and interest. It is the most a firm could call profit, not what is left.
Margins quoted online without a named source and a stated definition cannot be checked either way. Before comparing yourself with any figure, find out whether it is before or after the owner is paid.
Check yours · fictional example · Harbour Plumbing & Heating · 2025
Harbour Plumbing & Heating is the invented firm in our example report: owner on the tools, three engineers and one office coordinator. Figures are GBP excluding VAT. Do the same four steps with your own year.
Invoiced value excluding VAT or sales tax.
£530,000 − £190,200 − £19,500 − £174,000 = £146,300
Field labour here includes £52,000 for the owner / working engineer, the wage the firm would pay someone else for those hours.
£146,300 − £92,800 = £53,500
Vans, office, premises, insurance, software, marketing, tools and depreciation.
£53,500 + £52,000 = £105,500
Nothing about the firm changed between steps 3 and 4. Only the definition did.
The example is invented to show the method. It is not a benchmark, and its margins are not evidence of what UK or US firms earn.
What makes a margin good
Why two good firms differ
Materials pass through
In the example, profit is 28.6% of revenue on servicing and 3.5% on bathroom installations. A firm doing mostly installations will show a lower percentage than one doing mostly service work, without being worse run.
Percentages hide hours
Profit per engineer hour is £30.27 on servicing and £3.99 on bathroom installations. If engineers are what you are short of, profit per hour is the figure to compare, as which plumbing jobs make the most money sets out.
Where to go from here
A firm-wide margin tells you whether there is a problem. It does not tell you where. Profit by job type splits the same year by the kind of work, and the job type calculator does the first three steps for up to four types.
If the margin is thin, check your hourly price against your floor rate and how you spread overheads across billable hours before changing anything else.
See your margin job type by job type.
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Up to five years of your own jobs, with the owner's pay and every overhead rule written down and checked by a person.
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